Disappearence
by TheSweetSerenity
Summary: Natasha doesn't know when she started to care. But now she seems to be invested, so she might as well go track down wherever Clint, Tony, and Bruce got off to and find out who took them in the first place. Because while she might not know when she started to care, she does know she cares. A little bit of Clint, Bruce, and Tony whump and some Natasha protectiveness.


**So, to all my loyal readers of Poison, I did warn you that I was working on something else, so...moral of the story is no new chapter for Poison, but there is a whole new story! **

**This idea came to me a long, long time ago and then I re-found it and I just started going and BAM! I love seeing protective Natasha, because I think she would be pretty protective. Well, I think they would all be protective of each other. But I focused on Natasha for this one. **

**As always, read, review, and enjoy! :D**

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Natasha knows that Clint has been spending a lot of time down in the labs with Bruce and Tony. She's never really liked Tony and is still wary of Bruce, but for Clint, she'll try not to kill the first and, well, she was going to say pretend that Bruce doesn't set her on edge, but she's not really pretending anymore. The more time she spends with Bruce, the more she sees that he's really got this monster under control and the more missions they do, the more she gets that the Hulk really can do more than get angry—he's even given each of them a nickname. He's grown protective of them and amazingly, turns gentle around them (they're still working things out between Thor and Hulk, but they've gotten better).

So when all three of them go missing, Natasha is understandably pissed. Whoever takes them enlists a divide and conquer technique.

They grab Clint while he's on a mission. Natasha gets the news when she's on her own mission a couple countries away, so she tells Fury to go fuck himself and follows Clint's trail. She doesn't get far before all traces vanish, so she returns home to use Tony and Fury's resources to find him.

A few hours after Clint disappears, Bruce is shot full of sedatives the second he steps out of the protection of Stark Tower on his way to a guest lecture that Tony had set up for him. Bruce hadn't wanted to go, but Tony assured Bruce and the school that everything would be fine. For some reason, Bruce trusted Tony the most out of all of them, so eventually he agreed. Too bad he never made it to the school.

Natasha sees what this really is—someone is taking the Avengers down one by one. She calls the rest of the Avengers home, but is unable to reach Tony. Jarvis gives her the reason right away: Tony had been on his way to a conference in Europe when the plane lost contact an hour into the flight. Normally, Jarvis would be able to track either the briefcase suit Tony always carries with him or, even better, the arc reactor, but this time there's nothing. Natasha can tell even Jarvis is worried.

Thor and Steve are both there within the hour. Neither is happy when she tells them the news. Jarvis is scanning for any sign of Tony, Fury is having S.H.I.E.L.D look for any chatter about the three of them, and Natasha is visiting all of the contacts she trusts with news of the missing men. It's Jarvis who gets the first break through. He calls Natasha back to the tower to inform her that the briefcase armor has just destructed and that he has a lock on its location. A quinjet is already on the landing pad, just waiting for them to board, coordinates already set into the system.

The location is good. Tony's captors obviously hadn't known about the self-destruct code he had in all of his suits that was triggered when someone other than him even touched the suit's systems. Steve and Thor decide for the head-on approach, to let themselves be used as a distraction while Natasha snuck in and found their missing members.

She corners a guard and gets Clint's location first. Clint will always come first. She finds him chained to a chair, looking worse for wear, but she's seen him look worse.

"Tasha," he breathes when she jumps down from the vents. She thinks he says it in relief, but she can tell it's not for his sake. For him, this is like a walk in the park. She gets to work on the chains.

"The others?" she asks.

"They're keeping Bruce drugged, but they've been forcing changes with him, trying to revert him back to the monster he used to be, but-"

But they've all been working with Bruce on controlling the Hulk, Tony most of all. He willingly spends time with the Hulk when accidents do happen, and she's never seen the green guy take a violent step toward Tony. Because of all the practice Bruce has gotten, he and his monster are more in tune than ever. Bruce reports being able to remember parts of their fights, and when the Hulk gets stuck, he uses Bruce's brain to get out of the situation.

"Tony?"

Clint grimaces and Natasha knows that it's Tony he really worries about. "You need to get to him now. They want weapons."

Natasha understands. They've picked him up after he escaped from a kidnapping once since becoming a team. He was edgy, jumpy, and it took a month before the haunted look finally left his eyes. The bruises lingered even longer. It should have been a sign that he was growing on her when she returned to the base they had found him by the next day and tracked down the man in charge. Eventually she had handed him over to S.H.I.E.L.D, but first she made sure he understood what would happen to him if he ever touched Tony again.

The chains on his hands fall off, leaving only the chains wrapped around his stomach and legs. "I'll find Banner once I get free and then meet up with you. You're going to need help," Clint says.

Which means Clint's captors _had _injured Tony and that they had been bragging about it to Clint, probably to make him feel helpless. They probably hadn't noticed the tactic was actually working.

Natasha nods to him and opens the door, finding two guards standing outside. She kills one, then gets Tony's location from the other one before knocking him out and stealing the key card that he assures her opens the door to Tony's cell.

Tony is on the other end of the compound, next to all the labs that they obviously hoped Tony would enter and use to create them weapons. The supplies are still sitting out on the table collecting dust. Three guards stand outside Tony's door, completely stripped of all technology—including guns. Not that she really blames them. People tend not to trust Tony with any form of technology.

The first guard is easy, since she still has the element of surprise. The second one she manages to drop before he gets a whistle to his lips, probably to call back up. The last one gets in a kick to her chest, shifting a couple of ribs, before she manages to subdue him as well. She swipes her stolen key card, happy when the light flashed green and the door unlocks.

It's more or less like the room they're holding Clint in. She finds Tony on the other side of the room, a chain around one wrist and the chain attached to the wall. He's sitting down, his legs bent to his chest and his head leaning back against the wall. His eyes are closed, but Natasha can see the rise and fall of his chest. He doesn't move when she kneels down next to him and she really doesn't like that. Tony was _always _moving.

"Tony," she says quietly, setting a hand on the arm attached to the wall. Tony has never really shocked her in all of their time together, nor has he ever gotten the drop on her, but he manages to do both in one move. The second her hand makes contact with his arm, his eyes jump open, his other hand coming up to grip her wrist in what could easily turn into a bone shattering grip. Natasha doesn't even have time to react. Instead, she forces herself calm and remains completely still as Tony's eyes take in her form. She can tell from his pupils and his breathing that they've drugged him, but that he's fighting the drugs. "Tony," she says again. Slowly the grip softens, then, finger by finger, he drops her wrist.

"Sorry," he says quietly, with a hoarse voice. Natasha tries not to think about why it is. She picks up his chained wrist and gets to work on the locks. "The others okay?" he asks, leaning his head back against the wall, closing his eyes again. The drugs were probably administered in hopes of lowering his guard, but if Natasha knows one thing about Tony it's that the more someone tells him to do something, the more stubborn he becomes. She's seen him do it before when they tried to get him to leave his lab and come eat. His captors probably saw him do it when they wanted him to make weapons.

"Clint's fine. He's going to get Bruce." Natasha takes in his form for injuries. His left shoulder has been dislocated and then reset, probably from fighting the guards. There are a few bruises on his face, but nothing like what she expected.

"He's going to be exhausted. They've been forcing him to-"

Tony shifts and Natasha can see where the real problem lies.

There have only been a few times in her life where she has felt white-hot rage for someone else, and they've always been because of Clint. This is the first time she's felt it for someone else, and she would have never guessed that in a million years it would be for Tony, but now she's put several facts together.

Fact one: it's too dark in the room. It's always bright when Tony's around, especially when his clothes are as thin as they are now.

Fact two: there are wires coming out from underneath his shirt that are connected to what looks like a modified car battery.

Fact three: even for being doped with drugs, Tony is lethargic and barely functioning.

Fact four: Jarvis said he couldn't track Tony's arc reactor. There would only be one reason for that.

She feels like she's having an out of body experience when she hears herself ask Tony, "They took the arc reactor?"

He "hmms" in response and she sees him clench his hands on the ground and not go up and touch where the reactor used to be. "Fought back too much. Was too stubborn. Took it out to quiet me. Vincent seems to know an awful lot about it," he says, opening his eyes to look at her. He's telling her that someone, somewhere, has betrayed his trust and that, not only will he find that someone, but that he has a lot of hacking to do when he gets home. She has a feeling that S.H.I.E.L.D's information on the arc reactor is about to be diminished, but at this point, she's willing to help him.

"Vincent?" she asks, realizing Vincent was probably their captor.

"Vincent Keller. Runs black market weapons trading. His dad tried to kidnap me when I was what, eight? Inherited his dad's contacts when daddy dearest was killed. Same fascination with me as his dad. 'S creepy," Tony declares. Natasha smiles a little, glad to know Tony isn't completely ruined.

"Where's the reactor?" She's going to need to go and get that before they move anywhere.

He waves toward the door with one hand. "In one of their labs. They were going to try and work on it. It's probably destructed."

Natasha fights down her urge to leave Tony here and hunt down this Vincent man. She'd give him the same lesson she gave Tony's last kidnapper, except this time, he wouldn't be going to S.H.I.E.L.D. In fact, they'd never even find his body. Right now though, she needs to figure out how to get Tony out of here, car battery and all.

Even drugged and exhausted, his mind still makes connections quickly. "Should get Banner and Clint out now. Come back for me. Still be here."

It could be true. If Steve and Thor are successful in defeating all of the guards and finding Vincent and whoever else is in charge here, no one would touch Tony in all that time. But if someone with some kind of power manages to escape the two men's path, they could head to his cell and pull Tony's connection to the battery. Or take him with them. Hell, a simple guard could come by and pull the connection. It was too risky. Besides, she would never leave a teammate behind.

"Can you walk?" she asks instead. Tony looks down at his legs and Natasha follows his eyes. One ankle is swollen and she can see that it has a bruise discoloration similar to those of broken ankles. In the light, she can see his other knee is swollen as well, probably dislocated. He looks back at her.

"Sure, why not?" Natasha bites her lip. Clint, she expects to get up and walk, but he has been trained for this. Still, she turns her attention back to the lock and easily turns the last pin. The chains fall away.

"Ready?" she asks him. He gathers the battery up in the arm with the swollen shoulder, then holds the other one out to her.

"Nope," he answers, but doesn't protest when she starts pulling him to his feet. He groans as he settles weight on the broken ankle and his breath comes faster, but she sees his good knee lock, refusing to let him fall back down. She slides underneath his good arm, taking some of the weight off his injured legs.

They haven't gotten much further than outside the door when Clint and Bruce round the corner. Clint has been cleaned up a little, probably by Bruce, and is barely limping. Bruce himself has only a few scratches and dark bags under his eyes, but she can see there are still some drugs in his system. She thinks she sees a flash of green in his eyes when he looks at Tony.

"Nice of you to show up," Tony pants. His voice doesn't hold its usual sarcasm, but Bruce still smiles back and Clint answers with, "Sorry, we were kind of got cornered by a few guards. Next time we'll let them know we have a pain in the ass billionaire to save and I'm sure they'll let us right through."

"Damn straight they will," Tony responds, but he lacks the strength to say much more. Bruce moves forward.

"Personally, I'd like to get out of here," he says, setting a hand on the battery Tony is carrying, but makes no move to take it from his hands. Tony hesitates, but the sound of men down the hallway convinces Tony to relinquish the hold on his current form of life support.

"Sounds great buddy," Tony says, allowing Bruce to move under his other arm. Natasha sees him cringe as his swollen shoulder is pulled too far, but he doesn't say anything.

"Clint," she says, shifting her weight so she could get to her reserve guns and a couple of her throwing knives. He takes them with a smile.

Whatever Steve and Thor are doing, it's working. They barely meet any guards on their way out.

"Leaving so soon? That's awfully rude of guests," a male voice says behind them. Natasha feels Tony tense and see Bruce's face tighten with a mix of fear and anger.

"I did warn you that we wouldn't make very good guests," Tony says, as the three of them maneuver to turn around. Clint is already in front of them, his borrowed gun pointing at a man's head who must be Vincent.

"Your words weren't nearly as eloquent then," Vincent says. He has a smile very like Tony's, in that it radiated charm, but it was a smile that sets Natasha on edge, whereas Tony's just made her want to smack him.

"I felt like we already knew each other so well though, what with you breaking my ankle at the time and shooting me up with drugs."

Clint's grip on the gun tightens.

"Clearly we need to get to know each other better, as I am still without answers to my questions." Vincent nods to someone behind them and Natasha turns her head slightly to take in the extra men filling the hallway behind them. Trapped. Where the hell were Steve and Thor?

"You may want this back," Bruce says quietly to Tony, handing him the car battery and slipping from underneath his arm. Natasha wants to protest—Bruce is exhausted and another change won't do him good. But Tony is weak.

No, not weak. Natasha realizes she's only seen Tony weak once, and that was when Pepper was missing and he had no way of tracking her. But he only has his sharp words and his quick mind to defend himself and that's no weapon against guns. Hulk will do anything to protect Tony. She knows that too.

Suddenly the hair on her arms is rising, her skin tingling. "Down!" she shouts and tries to pull Tony down as gently as possible, but she knows she's probably injured him more. Clint and Bruce follow her down and the lights flicker as lightning crackles somewhere behind them. There are cries and the smell of burnt flesh as men drop. Amidst the lightning, she hears the sound of Steve's shield bouncing off of people and metal. Natasha looks back to see how Vincent is going to deal with this new development—he'll either start shooting or he'll disappear. It seems he's smart because when she looks, he's nowhere in sight.

"Clint," she says, nodding to the now-empty hallway. He growls and scrambles up. She'd like to follow him, but Bruce is still exhausted, Tony is still defenseless, and Steve and Thor are still a little busy. Somehow though, Steve makes his way over to them. The look on his face when he sees Tony is the closest to murderous as Natasha has ever seen it.

"Go," Steve says, copying her movement to Clint. "I've got their back. But _alive_."

Natasha untangles herself as carefully as she can from Tony, but he grabs her wrist to stop her before she can disappear.

"Give 'im hell," Tony said, his eyes hard. Had he had any ability to move, she has no doubt he would be at her side. She also has no doubt he wouldn't hesitate to kill Vincent.

She gives him a lethal smile. "I will." She gives Steve another look, begging him to keep the team safe. The other agents think that she is death wrapped up in a spandex suit, but they have never been part of a team like this. Should anything happen to her team, she's sure that she would go on a killing streak like the world had never seen before.

She catches up with Clint as he tackles Vincent from the ceiling. Both of them tumble, trying to gain the upper hand, until Vincent manages to throw Clint across the small hallway. Clint easily gains his footing again, and Vincent comes up with a gun. Before he can aim it at Clint, she makes her appearance, aiming a high kick at the gun, knocking it away. Before he can lunge for it, she brings her own gun to his forehead.

"I wouldn't, if I were you," she says. She has to respect him a little, because he glares at her, daring her to do it. She wonders if he thinks she won't. "Unfortunately, S.H.I.E.L.D wants you alive. I just want to make something else clear. Should you ever come after our team again, I won't hesitate to kill you."

He sneers at her. "You'll do as your masters say and bring me back like the good dog you are."

She smiles coolly at him. Behind her, she feels Clint shift in preparation eagerly. "Oh, they'll ask for you back alive, but there are so many…accidents that can happen on a retrieval. I could lose track of you. Another enemy could find you first. The gun could slip. A little like this," she says, lowering the gun and firing. He screams as the bullet tears through his knee. "Oops. Do I make myself clear?"

He was still glaring at her, panting through the pain. "Watch your back bitch. I have more powerful allies than you could even dream of."

"I really don't think you understand this," she says, moving forward to hold him against the wall and uses her arm to cut off his air supply. "I don't care who your allies are. If you touch my team, I will kill you."

"And if your 'allies' get to her before she can get to you, I'll be there to finish the job," Clint says behind her. Vincent's eyes track from her to him, then back to her. Just to make sure he understands her point, she knees him in the ribs. Hard.

He'll feel it soon enough. But for now, she brings the handle of the gun down on his head and pulls her arm back, letting him fall to the ground. Natasha really wants to shoot him again, but they have a team to return to. She grabs an arm, tries not to smile when she feels the shoulder pop out, and begins to drag him down the hallway. Clint follows behind her, watching her back.

"Did you mean what you said back there?" Clint asks.

"Every word."

She takes a glance at Clint to see he's smiling. "Didn't think you cared about the team."

She sets her mouth straight in the way that told Clint she was trying not to smile back. "Yes, well, if you insist on spending all of your time with them, I'm going to make sure their enemies don't come after you again."

"And if my enemies come after them?" He is completely serious now, wanting to know where she stands.

"My word still stands—nothing changes," Natasha responds. They turn the corner and find out that the cavalry has finally arrived. The rest of the men have been taken down. Agent Hill is standing in the middle of the chaos giving orders. Off to a side, Tony has been moved to sit against the wall. Steve and Thor stand in front of him, blocking off any access to him. Bruce has somehow acquired a medic's kit and is trying to convince Tony to cooperate with him. Clint detours over to the small group to help Banner manage Tony while she drags Vincent over to Hill. She drops him at the woman's feet and Vincent opens his eyes as his injuries are jarred, quickly taking in the scene around him.

"This is Vincent Keller. He deals in black market weapons, and he's behind the kidnapping of Tony, Clint, and Bruce," she says. Hill raises an eyebrow at her.

"There's a hole in his knee," Hill says as she leans down to cuff him. She accidently kicked his injured knee as she did.

Natasha remains straight faced, but she's happy that he's awake for this. "Accident. The gun slipped."

"Hm," Hill says, and her eyes flick over to the group along the wall. Her eyes harden as she keeps her neutral tone. "I'll make a note that he needs medical attention. Eventually. Kolls!" she snaps, and another agent appears at her side. "Put him with the rest of the uninjured."

Natasha nods to Hill before moving off to stand with her team. Tony's eyes are barely open anymore, but he still summons up the energy to bat Bruce's hands away every time he tried to raise them to a wound. Clint is standing next to him, keeping him awake with snarky banter.

"Tony," she says quietly, but the tone holds a demand in it. He opens his eyes to look at her, and even Clint and Bruce hold off. "You need medical attention. You can either go with S.H.I.E.L.D or home, where a S.H.I.E.L.D medical team will be waiting." She turns her glare to the other two next to him. "All three of you."

"Home please," Tony says and she thinks it's the meekest she's ever heard him. "I need another…" he gestured to his chest and all of them try not to think about how he flinches away and refuses to touch the empty hole. Steve immediately moves forward.

"Good. Jarvis is probably going to shut down soon if you don't give him an order."

Thor manages to snag a gurney from a passing agent and, despite Tony's protests, he and Steve lifted Tony up onto the gurney. They go the other direction, since their quinjet is parked away from S.H.I.E.L.D. After all, they didn't have the advantage of numbers; they had to hide their entrance. By the time they're boarded and on their way back to the tower, Tony is completely passed out. Bruce is leaning against the wall next to the bed, his eyes closed, but his body tense.

"Should we check some of his wounds now?" Steve murmurs to Clint and Natasha. Natasha shakes her head while Clint explains.

"Bruce is half-relaxed right now. If we make any motion towards Tony, it could startle him into a change. Plus, if you touch Tony while he's sleeping, he might try and attack. The best thing to do is get home and get a new reactor in his chest."

"Do we know where they are?" Natasha asks, suddenly worried that she'll have to place a frantic call to Pepper.

But Clint nods. "Bruce and I both know where they are. Jarvis will give us access."

"What about Pepper?" Natasha asks.

"I have already informed her, Agent Romanoff. She will be waiting at the landing pad with a new arc reactor for Mr. Stark. The medical team has already arrived," Jarvis replies. "I allowed myself to remain in the quinjet while you went to retrieve Agent Barton, Dr. Banner, and Mr. Stark," he says in explanation for his sudden appearance.

"Good work buddy," Tony says from his bed. Bruce turns his head slightly at Tony's voice, but doesn't open his eyes. "You get into their systems yet?"

"I have downloaded all information on their drives onto a ghost drive in your lab Mr. Stark."

Tony actually smiles at that and tries to prop himself up, but Bruce opens one eye to give him _the look_ that he doesn't use very often and Tony settles down. "I don't even know where we were this time. Tell me it wasn't the Middle East again."

"Bosnia," Clint says.

"I thought I recognized the accent," Tony says. "Makes sense for a black arms dealer to hole up there. Lots of violence in country, plus close enough to the Middle East to get a piece of their action too." Tony pauses to consider the ceiling of the quinjet and Natasha can see his struggle to pull himself out of the flood of memories. Clint sees it too and moves forward to help but Natasha shakes her head. He needs to pull himself out, because he's strong enough to do it. Pity never got any of them anything. "Long flight I suppose?"

This time when Clint moves forward, Natasha doesn't stop him, but follows him. Clint jumps up onto Tony's stretcher by his shoulder, leaning back against the wall. She sits next to Bruce, but leans forward so that her upper body is resting on Tony's stretcher. She can feel the heat from all three men's bodies. "Not too long since S.H.I.E.L.D got lazy and started sending us the same quinjet and you went on a caffeine induced spree and upgraded it to break the sound barrier," Clint said. "But yeah, long enough."

"Go to sleep," she tells them, giving them all her own patented look. They all have their own way of making each other realize they're serious.

"Wake me up 'fore we land," Tony tells her, even though she could swear he was already asleep. Bruce relaxes only the slightest bit, but she recognizes that he's at least resting. Clint's hand sneaks down to find hers, to grasp it and reassure her that they're all here, all _alive_.

Natasha wonders how she got to this point in her life. When did she start caring? When did she start trusting other people to watch her back? Thor soars in front of them, making sure the way is clear. Perhaps the biggest sign is that Jarvis is in complete control of the quinjet, flying them safely back to Stark Tower, a place where she actually has a few mementos-nothing big, and certainly nothing on display for the others to see, but just things that remind her that she has a team-tucked away. And while she contemplates this, she leans her head down on her arms and falls into a light doze, knowing that, for now, they're all safe.

Landing is just as hectic as she imagined it to be. Clint wakes up when Jarvis announces they're an hour out, Bruce waking up not long after. She wakes Tony up when they're a half hour away, and he comes awake gasping and clutching for his lost arc reactor. He has a slight panic attack when it's not there, and his foggy, drug-riddled brain refuses to remember what's happened. Finally, the three of them manage to talk him down and Natasha wonders what would have happened if any of them weren't there.

She'll get her answer later that night, and if a few of the S.H.I.E.L.D medics suddenly find themselves without a job, well, she definitely had nothing to do with it.

There's a crack of thunder as Thor lands ahead of them, clearing the area and watching all of the waiting people with wary eyes. Natasha sees Pepper moving forward before the quinjet has even finished landing, Jarvis navigating the ship like a trained pilot.

"'Lo Pepper," Tony says with a weak smile, and she grabs his hand and squeezes it gently. There's tears in Pepper's eyes, but she's all business as she approaches the group.

"Natasha, I'll need your help with this. Clint, the group to the right is prepared for your check up, Bruce, the one on the left is for you. We need to move him down to the lab, so we can get Jarvis' help as well."

"I have already begun turning on the necessary machines Ms. Potts," Jarvis said. As they roll the gurney off of the ship, Jarvis locks it up as he opens the elevator door for him. It's Tony's-and the team's- personal elevator, which will take them directly to Tony's lab.

"Right here," Pepper instructs her, and no sooner than the gurney stops than a hologram pops up, carefully showing the intricate details of the metal casing of the arc reactor, as well as the layout of the body that lies underneath.

"Still with us Tony?" Natasha asks. She props the bed up into a sitting position and notices that he relaxes quickly once he can see what's going on around him.

"Of course," Tony says tiredly. "Wouldn't miss this for the world. Remember what to do Pep?"

"I wish you wouldn't have taught me how to do this," Pepper says miserably as she looks at the hologram before them. Despite her words, she hands Natasha a glowing arc reactor with an electromagnet attached. "Hand that to me the second that I get these cables out, okay?" Then she takes a deep breath and slowly eases her hand down into Tony's chest, watching the hologram before her carefully. As soon as her fingers are centimeters from the connection, she looks at Tony. "Ready?"

"I trust you Pepper," he says softly and Pepper pulls the connection. They still have a few moments, but that doesn't mean that they dawdle. Pepper is careful to never touch the wires to the metal edging of the arc reactor, but Natasha can see the burn marks now that she's looking for them, from Tony's time in Afghanistan and his recent captivity. Natasha is offering the arc reactor before Pepper even throws the cables aside. Tony's breath is beginning to stutter, and Pepper carefully lowers the magnet down, again, careful to avoid the metal plating. It clicks in and everyone in the room, short of breath or not, lets a great breath go in relief. Tony reaches up a hand to grab Pepper's, not even minding the whatever the hell is on her hand. "Thanks Pep. You're the best."

Pepper is starting to shake and Natasha knows they need to get Tony to an area where he can receive medical treatment. Pepper leans down to kiss Tony. "Never do that to me again, okay?"

Tony just smiles, but Natasha knows it's been a ritual of sorts for the two of them. Tony never makes promises he can't keep.

They roll Tony up a few more floors to where he's set up their makeshift medical bay when the whole team had first moved in here. None of them liked spending time in the hospital, and home was always way better than the helicarrier. Clint is sitting up in his bed, his right ankle and knee in a brace, his left arm in a cast, while Bruce is fast asleep in a bed next to him. Clint glares at any doctor who tries to go near the sleeping doctor. Clint gives Natasha and Pepper a nod as they wheel Tony up on Clint's other side—he'll watch Tony now.

"Thank god Clint's there," Pepper says as she leads Natasha to one of the kitchens, rubbing her bare arms like she's trying to start a fire. "Last time I left Tony alone with a medical team, he woke up and started panicking so they sedated him and strapped his wrists to the bed."

Again, Natasha cannot be held responsible for what happened to said doctors.

Pepper finds two mugs and pours them coffee. Natasha can smell that it's one of Tony's favorites, and that it's freshly brewed. She sips it as she watches Pepper tap her fingers restlessly on the table.

"I wanted to talk to you about what happened in Tony's lab," Pepper says finally, looking frustrated. Natasha has never seen Pepper struggle for words, but she acts like nothing is wrong and raises an eyebrow.

"You know I won't tell anyone about anything that I saw, right?" Natasha asks.

"I know. And so does Tony. That's why you stayed with me. If he hadn't wanted you there, you wouldn't have been," Pepper says, raising her own eyebrow in response.

It hits Natasha then, just how intimate of an experience she's shared with Pepper. The red-head was literally holding Tony's life in her hands, and he allowed her to be a part of that. Tony was just as paranoid as the rest of them-sometimes, she thought even a little bit _more _paranoid- but if this ever happened to Tony again, she would know how to fix it, and then _she _would be holding Tony's life in her hands. And he trusted her to do so.

The raised eyebrow Pepper is giving her is a challenge—_you break the trust Tony has put in you, I'll break you. _And Natasha has no doubts that Pepper would find some way to do it.

"I will protect him with my life," Natasha replies in her native tongue. She doubts Pepper will understand it, but she's surprised when Pepper nods her acceptance.

"I just wanted to make sure you knew where you stood, because if I waited for Tony to do it, it wouldn't happen."

Natasha wonders again when she started caring about having other people's trust in return.

Recovery is as terrible as she expects. Bruce sleeps for almost 72 hours straight while they have to drug Tony to get him to sleep. Clint is, as he always is, a terror to everyone around him, demanding to be allowed to get up, run around, and shoot his bow. He doesn't take well to sitting still.

Bruce is the first one up and that takes some of the stress off of Natasha. He understands that-even though Tony is high off of pain medication- he needs something to occupy his time because genius brain doesn't understand how to shut itself off. Although, Natasha wonders how much of it is an act, because she's pretty sure she catches him going through the information Jarvis downloaded off of Vincent Keller's system. When he catches her looking, he gives her a grim smile and she doesn't take the computer away, so he continues to do it.

After Bruce, Clint is finally released another two days later. The doctors have run out of excuses to hold him down while his broken ribs heal, so they let him go. They instruct Natasha not to let him walk around without the braces on, but knows that she'll never find them once Clint takes them off.

Eight days after Natasha, Thor, and Steve rescued their other three members, Tony breaks out of the medical bay. She knows he's been planning it since Clint got released, and she knows that at least Bruce is in on it, because the machines don't start wailing until well after Tony's gone. The doctors are mystified, but the Avengers know where he is if they need him—in the lab, with Jarvis, pouring over the footage and data he obtained from Keller. Natasha has no doubt that he'll find a couple of caches of Stark Weapons, as well as his "powerful allies" that Keller threatened Natasha with.

Nine days after the rescue, Fury calls Natasha, snapping in her ear. It takes her a second to decipher what he's saying—_someone_-not naming names-hacked into their system. Suddenly, everything that was top secret, that only S.H.I.E.L.D had information on, pertaining to Tony Stark is gone, as well as several more personal files on the rest of the team.

"Are you sure it's Tony?" Natasha asks sweetly. "He's been locked in his room all day."

And if anybody questioned her, the whole team, plus Jarvis and Pepper, would back her up.

"That doesn't mean he didn't do it," Fury says, though his voice is slower. She has no doubt that he knows what she's doing.

"With the pain killers he's on? Not likely," Natasha scoffs. There's a loud noise that Natasha knows is Fury throwing something across the room.

"Ask him about it," he says through gritted teeth. "If it wasn't him, ask him who else has the ability to do it."

"Right away Director Fury," she says, then hangs up the phone. Clint's head pops up over the couch.

"Trouble?" he asks.

"Not anymore," she responds. She wonders if now would be a good time to talk to Clint about the plans that she knows he has, the plans about what to do when their conflicts of interest between the Avengers and S.H.I.E.L.D collide. She knows which side she'll pick, and she knows what side Clint will pick, and she wonders if they really need to voice it.

She decides not.

On day ten after the rescue, or rather, night ten, she hears something outside her door. She grabs a gun, but she knows as she approaches the door that whoever was there is long gone. Still, she flicks the safety off the gun before she opens the door.

A tablet with a post-it note attached to it is sitting on the floor outside of her room. She picks both up and retreats back to her bed. The post-it note has two phrases written on it, one under the other. The first reads "Ghost Spider" while the one underneath it reads "Rushman Black." They make no sense to her, though it's clear that they're written by Tony—he's the only other one besides Clint on the team that knows her Natalie Rushman alias. She turns the tablet on.

A video pops up first and she doesn't need more than the first second to recognize it. It's taken off of the camera feed from Keller's bunker and it has a clear angle of Natasha threatening Keller. It plays until she drops him and begins to drag him away. The screen goes blank, and then Jarvis' voice fills the room.

"File access?" he asks. Natasha looks down at post-it note.

"Ghost Spider."

"Password?" Jarvis asks.

"Rushman Black."

The tablet's screen flares to life, showing her an overview of everything she now has available at her fingertips. There are basic layouts of the different components of the arc reactor, information on where the arc reactors are and how to get to them, codes that will activate different modes of Jarvis, including defense mode, attack mode, stealth mode, and the code to a room that held an EMP, one that was powerful enough to take out all of Tony's machinery and his arc reactor.

Pepper thought that Tony wouldn't have let Natasha know where she stood, but this served just as well. Before she begins to explore this new world, she grabs the post-it note and a lighter and proceeds to burn the post-it note until it's just tiny pieces of black ash.

She still isn't sure when she started to care about other people, started trusting other people, started caring about whether or not they trusted her, but she's got this feeling in her stomach that just feels _right_ so she doesn't really care if she can track it back to a certain time. She just knows that she'll do whatever it takes to keep everything just the way it is.


End file.
